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Non-Academic Administrators include people like me. I'm a librarian.

Yes, I know what the phrase means, and I didn't mean to imply anything bad about all administrative (or "non-academic") positions -- AT ALL. I'm all for libraries and librarians. Apparently, if this blog is to be believed, the issue at this particular school is that there's also a significant amount of jobs going to friends of existing administrators going on in administrative hiring. I have no idea whether these claims are true, but the implication of the blog is that unnecessary jobs are being "created" and sometimes unqualified people are getting them.

This is NOT an indictment of all administrative staff at all institutions, let alone those who provide important services to students.

On the other hand, the reality of budgets at many schools is that administrative costs are rising at alarming rates (along with costs for new buildings and facilities, etc.), while academic budgets are static or going down, with more and more adjunct faculty hired at levels below minimum wage just to cover basic teaching needs.

These are general trends, and this blog seems to claim that one university has some particularly problematic stuff going on. Again, I have no idea how true it is, but that's the subject of this thread.

That "Non-Academic" phrase gets thrown around a lot and frequently includes people like guidance counselors who DO have an impact on student success.

Yep. That's great. SOME "non-academic" growth is certainly necessary at many universities to provide various kinds of student services, whether that's a career counselor or just an extra person at the registrar's office to facilitate student access to records.

The issue is the rate of growth relative to academic areas, making these administrative costs a significant driver of increasing tuition rates, as discussed in many news stories in the past few years. In many cases, these "administrative" staff have increased anywhere from 5 to 10 TIMES the rate at which faculty and academic staff have increased.

I'm all for providing student services, but if all of these guidance counselors and librarians, etc. are necessary for student success, what had colleges been doing before these giant increases in administrative hiring in the past decade? How could they possibly have functioned before with so few administrators?

I'm not at all saying that administration is somehow "bad" -- it's just that the growth seems disproportionate to other areas, and I'm certainly not the only person to have commented on that trend in the past few years.

That's a pretty butch question. In my current state, I'd have trouble answering it with any chance of respectful reception. What I can say immediately, is how the bloody hell is the current system going to hold? I also don't believe bitcoin has reached maturity yet. Like a beaten and resented prodigy, it's growth has been hindered by various factors. Maybe the way it would work under such circumstances is a matter of additional innovation, adaptation, or redesign. I hope it never comes to that, but if it does, it would be nice to see things get the hell out of its way with anything but positive input. I am sure some fellow slashers will do a brilliant job taking this in 360 degrees, and far beyond what I am capable of.

On the subject of goats, [gardens] and chickens, that's another manipulated value, considering that in many locations throughout the US and other nations it's illegal to have them.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/08/woman-jailed-for-vegetable-garden_n_893516.html
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2012/04/illegal-curbside-garden-flourishes/1728/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/20/illegal-kitchen-garden_n_1687558.html - CA
http://www.aolnews.com/2010/09/15/cabbagegate-ga-man-fined-5k-for-home-garden/
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/10/weird_zoning_laws
http://www.newson6.com/story/18802728/woman-sues-city-of-tulsa-for-cutting-down-her-edible-garden
And so on and so on.

What kind of backwards country would modify their curriculum to fit religious ideals?

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/03/12/texas-removes-thomas-jefferson-from-teaching-standard/

He's not accused of rape.

Why don't you save us all some effort and supply a simple citation?

Oh, wait, you can't. I'm guessing that's why you post A/C.

Me? I'll provide all the cites you want.

What they're trying to charge him with is sex by surprise. Nobody's quite sure what that is but we know the maximum penalty for it is a $715 fine.

This fine is why the whole Interpol warrant and extradition is a farce - it simply doesn't happen for a crime as minor as that (in fact it's against Interpol's charter to get involved with this - the crime is too minor and it only happened in a single country).

It's pretty simple - Japan doesn't really design robots to do jobs that humans can't do. Japan designs robots so that they don't have to let foreigners into the country. Therefore, most of the robotics research has been to deal with problems introduced by an aging closed society - things like taking care of the elderly, farming or teaching English to students (though the last one is actually South Korea).

Japanese don't want any non-Japanese in their country doing these jobs (I speak from experience) but they're fine blowing billions of dollars to try and solve the problem with robots. Nuclear power plant meltdown isn't this sort of problem so there was no research funding for it.

The REM is a measure of the dose, not the rate. If the information is correct, then it will be 10 microrem per scan. "From time you step in to time you step out", 10 microrem, if there is only one scan. Two scans, 20 urem. Fifty scans, 500 microrem.

Ya, I'm not a nuclear physicist. :) The point still stands. Is that 10 microrem on a single pulse, scan line, one second of exposure? Wanting it to be safe, we can assume from entrance to exit. But if we were working for the company who produces them, we'd put the best spin possible on it, and say "10 microrem" without explaining that it's on a single pulse or scan line. Sure, let people assume it's total exposure, and we'll pretend that none of it goes off it is ever reflected outside of this uncontained space. In reality, it's very likely that you get at least 3 or 4 doses. Probably 2 while you're waiting to go in, one while you're in it, and one while you're standing on the other side waiting for your shoes.

A Geiger counter meaures rate, not dose. You need to carry a dosimeter if you want to measure

ya, but it would likely be more useful to know what the exposure area is. Just because the badge turns black only means that you did indeed receive exposure.

your dose. Those can be as simple as a film badge. You could even hide that badge under your clothing so the TSA droid wouldn't be ordering you to "put that electronic doohickey through the x-ray machine" and keeping you out of the scanner. You'd have to deal with the aftermath of having the dosimeter on you when it was discovered after the fact, but I doubt they'd confiscate it (if they even knew what it was. I've had TSA baggage searchers who looked quizically at something most people would immediately recognize as "a book".)

There's an easy explanation. "I'm a contractor for the NRC, and I am exposed to radiation as part of my job. I am to always wear my dosimeter, so I am sure I haven't exceeded the legal limits. Whereas you are using equipment that does involve radiation (pointing to the carry-on scanner and body scanner), it is important to my health that I know my total exposure per year."

On second though, their eyes will glaze over by the time I got to "NRC". That, and I don't know enough about the NRC's operations to keep the story going. :) I could say "classified", but one phone call will show that lying.

I've had all kinds of questions about stuff I'm carrying. Lots of people have been confused about what I'm carrying. Most of it I can say "computer stuff", and they're happy. You know, it's easier to check my bag with a firearm in it, than carry a second laptop through security. I don't do it on every trip, but often enough.

Oh, and I just found This link from June, 2011 where they say all the people who are monitoring their equipment. This story from Dec, 2010 states that it's false. I guess the lies are still good, as long as not everyone knows...

    I pick groped every time. They're asking me more often why I refuse the radiation. X-rays, microwaves, whatever, I'm not going to stand in your uncertified, uncalibrated ionizing emitting equipment.

• 1971 - Julian Assange is born
• 1988 - Julian Assange reached age where he is physically and emotionally capable of committing a sex crime
• 2007 - Wikileaks published first "sekret" US govt document.
• 2010 - allegations of sexual crimes against not one, but TWO different women.

Tendency to commit a crime before US govt got framed: 0 in 22 years
Tendency to commit a crime after US govt got framed: 2 in 3 years
Either use your brain or join the masses: "raped two different women overnight.... bastard!"

Wait for that Kent state moment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings.
Add in the http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/26/illegal-steroid-use-among-police-officers-a-big-problem/ performance-enhancing drug aspect too.

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/03/09/petas-euthanasia-rates-have-critics-fuming/

http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=peta+euthanasia

Only valid under the assumption that the accusations are bogus.

The accusations are... confusing.

"Despite what has happened, the woman who organized the event and had Assange stay at her apartment told Aftonbladet that she never intended that Assange be charged with rape.

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/02/sex-by-surprise-at-heart-of-assange-criminal-probe/

This is how they smuggle drugs too. And when the package is intercepted, it is the passenger that goes to jail.

This is one reason why I try to never check-in luggage. Of course, I seldom fly anymore.

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/04/28/baggage-handlers-arrested-in-drug-smuggling-bust-at-detroit-airp/

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/1992-04-24/news/9204240104_1_baggage-handlers-orlando-international-airport-luggage

http://www.gadling.com/2008/04/22/madrid-airport-luggage-handlers-smuggle-17-kilos-of-cocaine-into/

etc. etc. etc...

"Our society doesn't have the will for one-way trips."

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/12/why-volunteer-for-a-one-way-mission-to-mars/
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/01/12/space-cadets-400-people-volunteer-for-one-way-trip-to-mars/

And, several more hits on Google. Society at large didn't have the balls necessary to sail with that silly Italian named Columbus, either. The job will be done, sooner or later, all the same. SpaceX seems the most likely candidate at this point in time, but it may be China or the EU that gets it done first. Russians? Probably not, but they could surprise me too. India? Ditto - probably not, but they could surprise me.

>

Here's a US Army Colonel who contradicts Sagan:

The evidence he speaks of includes the hard data of sensor technology that has frequently confirmed the reality of physical craft and the high quality of extremely reliable eyewitnesses who are "neither misreporting facts nor delusional."

You're kidding right? If I claim I have evidence of a mountain of gold hidden under Yankee Stadium, including all manner of sensor data, are you going to take me at my word? People make claims like this all the time. Guess what? The evidence never turns up, or if it does, it is found to be mistaken or fake. Every time.

Personally, I doubt we are alone in the universe. However, there has never been any validated evidence of any visitation to Earth. What Sagan points out is that we have very good answers to the question "How can otherwise reasonable people be utterly convinced that they have been taken aboard an alien craft when there is a lack of any evidence to show it actually happened?"

Before UFO's there were demons, beasts, witches, etc. The current myth-of-the day is UFO's.

Ah, I see what you did there. Demons and witches are imaginary, so UFO's must be too. Sagan was a smart guy, but I don't see why his application of pop-psychology to the matter has any weight.

Here's a US Army Colonel who contradicts Sagan:

The evidence he speaks of includes the hard data of sensor technology that has frequently confirmed the reality of physical craft and the high quality of extremely reliable eyewitnesses who are "neither misreporting facts nor delusional."

It's not so much that he knows where you were two hours ago, but that with a large enough history, he can predict where you'll be tomorrow at 5:00PM. http://www.aolnews.com/2010/02/18/scientists-make-it-official-people-are-so-predictable/

Hanging for bribery? A little harsh don't you think?

The Chinese don't think so.

Well.... They shot him rather than hanged, but I suppose its close enough.

In a speech last night Gaddafi, an ally of the ousted president, Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, said he was "pained" by the fall of the Tunisian government. He claimed protesters had been led astray by WikiLeaks disclosures detailing the corruption in Ben Ali's family and his repressive regime. The leaked cables were written by "ambassadors in order to create chaos", Deutsche Press-Agentur reported Gaddafi as saying.

The Iranian government have claimed that Wikileaks is a U.S. plot to destabilise anti-colonislist governments.

the release was an organized coordinated move, adding that such a huge volume of documents could not have been released without the cooperation of intelligence services of Western governments, in particular the US.

A former Pakistanti General has also claimed Wikileaks is a CIA/Mossad plot:

The US has a hand in this plot, and these reports (posted by the WikiLeaks website) are part of the US psychological warfare

Disclaimer: Tunisia: Don't Call It a WikiLeaks Revolution

It's not faith, because on some level, you're either judging which set of scientists are, to the best of your judgment, respected and reasonable. You're not pre-judging the answer because your religion or politics says "THIS ANSWER SUITS ME."

Furthermore, even if you're reading materials at second hand, rather than doing original research, you can still judge on the logic and consistency of those materials - your understanding may not be as perfect as someone qualified to do original research, but it's still reasonable to make a judgment on which account hangs together.

Also, let's NOT agree not to call this a "Republican" position. Because active SCIENCE DENIAL is a Republican phenomenon. It's Texas, not Massachusetts, who has people going through the school books and filtering them through a political lens. Hell, it's not limited to science - last I heard, they were going after the history books, too. http://www.aolnews.com/2010/03/12/texas-removes-thomas-jefferson-from-teaching-standard/

Charter flights. Look them up. I am so tired of telling people here that yes, if you ride a common carrier, you do have to do what the government requires of a common carrier to use the airspace, but charter flights that are not open to the general public have no TSA inspection requirement.

The TSA searches are not required of you, they are required of the airline and the airline makes your consent to such a condition of getting on their plane. You may be too young to remember, but there was a time when these searches were conducted by private security firms or airport security independent of the federal government. It was the failure of such on 9/11 that led to the TSA. Do you remember the big stink that was raised when it was proposed to turn the screening back over to private contractors and get the TSA out of doing the pat downs?

Here are some airports considering doing so now:

TSA to Private Contractors

Of course, the TSA doesn't want that to happen:

TSA Opposes Private Screening

Even if the locals want to:

Orlando Airport

Also realize that there was ALWAYS a provision in the act that established the TSA to allow airports to opt out and use their own screeners.

So, why exactly do you have to allow the TSA to do this if there is a way for airports and airlines to opt out and hire their own private contractors?

You know those WiFi-sensitive T-Shirts from ThinkGeek? Maybe it's time for something that responds to X-radiation...

New Clothing Line Reminds TSA of the 4th Amendment - http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/07/new-clothing-line-reminds-tsa-of-the-4th-amendment/

Not thrilled with the Transportation Security Administration's new touchy-feely pat down techniques and full-body scanners? Now there's a line of underclothes that offer a friendly reminder of the Fourth Amendment during controversial searches.

It's called 4th Amendment Wear.

Metallic ink printed on shirts spells out the privacy rights stated in the amendment and is designed to appear in TSA scanners.

We'll have to disagree. There's no practical way to eliminate guns from the US and, even if there were, it would not stop deranged individuals.

Here's another spree killer without a gun:
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/02/12/new-york-city-cops-arrest-maksim-gelman-in-deadly-rampage/

The laws didn't pass, no one on the list was killed (although some were forced to flee their homes), and I am assuming the preacher you are referring to is Jenkins, if so he did not support killing them and thinks the anti-homosexual intolerance has gone to far. But hey your version is much more exciting. http://www.aolnews.com/2010/11/21/georgia-preacher-leads-anti-gay-crusade-in-uganda/

Just when you thought Huff Post couldn't get any worse.

What's funny is that AOLnews actually looks like a professional news site, like Politics Daily. Huffington Post looks like a carnival side show.

Priority matters. Other hacking, spam ect does not reflect directly on the government. See also the UFO Hacker.

> 70 credits paid full-time, actually above the tuition level, plus health insurance, you can pocket the difference.

I live in the USA and never heard of this. Google doesn't turn up much expect Georgia lottery and even that is having problems:
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/07/hope-fades-on-georgias-free-college-tuition-program/

The Iranians continue in their attempts to spread their revolution to other countries. They were/are assisting insurgents in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places. They control the powerful state within a state that is Hezbollah in Lebanon. I believe they are also working in Central and South America. Their presence in so many other places is useful in more ways than one.

I think you will find this video revealing....there are plenty more at MEMRI worth seeing.

Obviously. Now if you search for fox news and yahoo deleting comments concerning the Arizona shooting Google does find results. And while I am not claiming this as an unbiased source I do not believe it is completely made up either... Palin facebook deleting negative comments

Now if you truly think it's absurd that anyone on the internet would post hateful things on Fox News website I really don't even know what to think of that.

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/05/report-pentagon-didnt-fully-investigate-child-porn-allegations/
"The investigators left 1,700 names on the list unchecked, defense officials have told Grassley."
They dont waste time looking.
As for this, welcome to the honeypot. Everybody who wanted to help "freedoms" is now on a list.
Did the other web 2.0 sites roll over like the CC and online retailers?
If so, will they go down the lists, name by name?

You should really give the people you choose to disagree with more credit. I hardly think it's a stretch to say flooding at unprecedented levels in Pakistan is extremely likely to be related to climate change. It's not like this was just some normal flood, at one point one-fifth of Pakistan's total land area was underwater.

At the very least we should be able to see that without climate change the flooding wouldn't have been as severe as it was. One of the most basic effects of a warming climate is to increase the amount of precipitation that wet areas get (and decrease the amount that dry areas get). More heat means more evaporation and that eventually means more precipitation.

Of course, not all weather incidents are related to climate change, but if climate change is occurring then we should be able to establish a baseline for what is a normal rate of weather disasters and then we can identify the number of events which lie outside of the expected range of events and we can therefore estimate the number of weather related disasters caused by climate change.

Which is what the Global Humanitarian Forum did when they estimated that 300,000 deaths in 2009 were attributable to climate change.

It isn't time to panic, but it is time to start taking the reasonable and logical steps to mitigate the effects of climate change. Many of those steps are still pretty good ideas even if you don't believe that climate change presents a danger.

WikiLeaks Founder Says Next Target Is Major US Bank

"Early next year, WikiLeaks will publish tens of thousands of internal documents from a major U.S. bank, exposing the institution's rampant corruption and unethical practices and executives' brazen self-interest, Assange said in an interview with Forbes magazine."

I don't see any credible evidence that they are professional prostitutes, and none of the sites returned by that search seem particularly objective. Anna Ardin does appear to have been on the U.S. payroll for anti-Communist activities though...

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/assange-rape-accuser-cia-ties/
http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/sex-by-surprise-at-heart-of-julian-assange-criminal-probe/19741444

What I said is fact, and nothing in your reply did anything to contradict any of it. The attacks are the result of fundamentalist (or extremist, if you like) Islamist thought; the funding and the manpower came from Saudi.

WRT Bin Ladin, it matters not one whit where he is -- kill him, another will rise. The Bin Ladin hunt is just theater for the gullible. Say we caught him; It'd be like them capturing and/or killing Obama or Petraeus: all that would do is further annoy us. Either side would have a replacement in zip time. But if a leader has no funding, and has no stream of ready recruits, then he has nothing.

So you either take care of this at the source, which is definitely radical Islam within Saudi Arabia, or you haven't taken care of it at all.

Afghanistan and Iraq are meaningless here. The strictly represent a sink for military effort, which in turn is a huge financial boon to the corporate entities that control congress. In order to accomplish anything significant militarily, Islamic interests and power bases within Saudi Arabia have to be the objective.

Look:

Where the money comes from (UK intelligence)

Saudi funds Taliban

Ramadan is key source of funding

Saudis greatest fund source for terror (US diplomatic cables)

If you can actually maintain the illusion that Afghanistan is the source of this problem, I'm sure there's nothing I can say or point to that will dissuade you - but that doesn't change the facts, which are plain and simple. The problem is Islam, it is centered in Saudi Arabia in both the financial (most important) and manpower senses. Either that gets addressed, or no solution is possible. Which shows up the Afghanistan and Iraq wars as no more than money-channeling theater. Not to mention a complete waste of American soldier's lives, not that such a thing matters to politicians other than as media opportunities.

"It doesn't contradict the observation that Iraq and Afghanistan are better off now than before."

I'm not so sure of that.

"The degree to which the American people are deceived by the cozy relationship between the press and government in the United States was clearly evidenced in my interview with with Mohammad Nizami, formerly the head of the Taliban's radio and TV network and now a member of the Karzai regime. He expressed his support for an Islamic government of Afghanistan ruled by strict Sharia law. He opposed equal rights for women and wanted to see foreign troops withdrawn. Only his timetable had changed. As a Taliban leader he had called for an immediate withdrawal. As a Karzai supporter he thought they should wait until the Afghan Army could stand on its own.

That tolerance for the continued presence of U.S. Troops was sufficient to make him an ally in the view of the United States and Karzai. The dirty secret you will never see exposed in the mainline media is that the Taliban's ideology and political views on the future of Afghanistan are quite similar to many of Karzai's top supporters, including members of his cabinet. They, too, want a fundamentalist-ruled Afghanistan and have nothing but contempt for democratic elections. The war pits two sets of fundamentalists against one another, the difference being one side has U.S. support and the other doesn't. "

http://johnshaplin.blogspot.com/2010/10/american-media-by-reese-erlich.html

http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/top-british-gen-sir-david-richards-says-west-cant-defeat-al-qaida-militarily/19715982

A fine tradition dating back all the way to the pharaohs and probably before even them. Still goes on too, albeit in a more restricted form. Eg. Texas removing Thomas Jefferson from textbooks. History is malleable and, more often than not, written by the powerful.

Shit, it's basically impossible to keep your computer "sufficiently secure" from anybody who has physical access to it all weekend like a co-worker. If someone wants to plant something on your machine, they're going to be able to do it. Even if you're paranoid and encrypt your hard drive and take your laptop home with you every night someone can still come in and stick a keylogger in your keyboard. Then it's just 10 minutes one lunchtime and you're forced to literally live under a bridge, alone and penniless until you die. That's the power of invoking one of our cultures most forbidden taboos.

We now know that almost 40 years ago, UFO Space Aliens were shining beams of light into nuclear weapons storage areas to make them inoperable . Former USAF officers will be having a press conference on Friday, to prove it. So, big deal on the whole lasers-cooling-molecules thing.

I have to admit that I thought that your claim was one of the worst bullshit urban legends I had ever heard. However I decided to Google it just to be sure and came up with

http://www.aolnews.com/surge-desk/article/palestinian-saber-kushour-accused-of-rape-of-deception-speak/19568421

I have lost a hefty amount of my minimal remain faith in humanity.

Normal sunscreen lotions cause cancer

There, fix'd that for you.

What about the long term ongoing leaks in Nigeria that are regularly the fault of US companies like Exxon Mobil? Those have been far more devastating to the areas effected due to the fact the US companies don't actually even clean those up at all in some cases. I think somehow the BP oil spill isn't even the biggest oil tragedy of the last decade in this context, let alone the biggest environmental disaster of the century.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/30/oil-spills-nigeria-niger-delta-shell

http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/nigerian-spills-make-valdez-look-like-drop-in-bucket/19483921

Of course, perhaps the worst part is that when the locals take action against oil companies responsible, they get branded terrorists an al Qaeda sympathisers by the West. It couldn't possibly simply be because they're sick of the kind of pollution that's occuring on their land could it?

Americans are right to be annoyed, and BP were incompetent and wrong in allowing the spill to happen. But what fucks me off more than anything is a) the anti-British sentiment from Obama over the whole thing, b) the fact this anti-British sentiment has been taken further in an attempt to tear BP apart as a company by some people, c) the fact that America consumes such vast amounts of oil pushing the need for such dangerous deep sea drilling in the first place, and d) the hypocrisy of points a), b) and c) in the context of the fact US companies and the US in general if it's to be believed that the Iraq war was about oil, have been guilty of far, far worse when it comes to oil. It's the utter hypocrisy, the arrogance of it that stinks- a proper reaction should've been some god damn soul searching over whether perhaps such dependence on oil is such a good idea after all and realisation that not just BP, but BP's partners such as the Texas company that owns a massive share in the well, Haliburton and Transocean which was responsible for some of the shoddy work that caused the problem, and most importantly, America itself and it's thirst for oil and it's weak regulations that allowed this to happen- isn't the fact oil companies only by law have to pay up £75 million over things like this evidence enough that American legislation holding oil companies to account is woefully inadequate?

In Florida a suspect used a Tazer to threaten some resturant employees, they were charged with assault with a DEADLY weapon. http://www.aolnews.com/weird-news/article/melanese-reid-accused-of-assaulting-daytona-beach-wendys-workers-with-taser/19484066

Actually, if you want to talk about across border propaganda, the current situation between the two Koreas fits perfectly.

On Wednesday, South Korean civic groups launched leaflets critical of the North’s communist’s regime, near the North Korean border to denounce the sinking of a South Korean warship in March.

Seoul resumed blaring propaganda broadcasts into its northern nemesis for the first time in six years

Eleven loudspeakers have already been installed along the border, and South Korea is attempting to set up electronic displays, according to the statement.

Really, imagine if North Korea had the internet or...even radio. Instead of just sending out crazy loud shit across their border, they could just broadcast radio signals or facebook pages instead.

The only thing I have against China being pissy about it is that, quite possibly, the unrest isn't stirred up from outside the country but is an accurate reflection of the internet using citizens (are they citizens?) within their country.

"First of all, America is just one of many (if not all) nations which are addicted to oil. Singling out the US and americans for this is preposterous."

Really?

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/ene_oil_con-energy-oil-consumption

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_oil_consumption

No other nation comes close to the US in oil consumption. Regarding the Wikipedia list, and the EU being second, remember that the EU has 535 million people in it and an economy around 15% larger than the US'. The US has a population of 300 million. In other words, the whole of the EU uses only just over 75% of the oil the US does, but has a far larger population and still manages to maintain a far larger economy. In other words, there's no real valid excuse for the US' massive oil consumption.

"Secondly, and more importantly, as much as we all want (or at least, need) oil, no one forced BP to cut corners and be sloppy."

No one raise their voice about it either, because it meant they could keep their oil cheap. Just as no one raised a concern about any of the other oil companies who equally cut corners. BP being the ones unfortunate enough that it happened to them, doesn't mean the other oil companies act any differently whatsoever.

"And I mean BP specifically. They have a far worse record than other companies."

One single incident is your source to prove they have a far worse record than other companies? That makes no sense whatsoever.

I guess the inconvenient truth that Exxon mobile itself is currently also responsible for a major underwater oil leak passed many people by, because Africa just can't make the kind of world media noise that Africa can:

http://saharareporters.com/real-news/sr-headlines/6244-exxonmobil-oil-spill-in-niger-delta-exposes-nigerians-to-poisoned-fish.html

http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/nigerian-oil-spills-make-exxon-valdez-look-like-drop-in-the-bucket/19483921

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/05/opinion/05iht-edejikeme.html

Do you still think the US is just like every other country in terms of oil addiction? Do you still think BP is somehow unique in it's spill? Feel free to search on the subject a little more to confirm the figures if you don't trust my links.

I say we make them fully and 100% accountable, and seize their global assets to the point they reach bankruptcy if necessary. The supertanker suckup option still exists but we have to stop Obama from running cover for these slimeballs and have direct action. They look at it in terms of cost to them to clean it up... our government ought to look at the cost of NOT taking action then seize control of the situation (and later of BP).

In case you hadn't noticed, it's not Obama that's running cover for them...

I say we make them fully and 100% accountable, and seize their global assets to the point they reach bankruptcy if necessary. The supertanker suckup option still exists but we have to stop Obama from running cover for these slimeballs and have direct action. They look at it in terms of cost to them to clean it up... our government ought to look at the cost of NOT taking action then seize control of the situation (and later of BP).

Unfortunately, while I wish I could say the rest of his claims are entirely without merit (due to the horrible implications), I cannot. His claims are exaggerated to some degree (PETA does not snatch the pets), the kernel of the accusation about euthanizing pets seems to be true.

In 2009, PETA euthanized 2,301 cats and dogs brought into it's headquarters and only adopted out 8 cats and dogs.

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/petas-euthanasia-rates-have-critics-fuming/19384880

No they don't. How do they have the incentive to do that when they have less and less working funds? If I have $50 million I can put into R&D for alternate energy without a carbon tax or cap and trade or $25 million I can put into R&D for alternate energy with cap and trade/carbon tax which do you think will get more work done?

Silly hypothetical that doesn't reflect what happens in reality. If there's a cap and trade system, the industries that become very efficient get further gain from trading offsets. This helps in particular the industries that would not be able to do so efficiently. This creates a large incentive for certain industries to do research.

Yes, regulating So2 has worked because Sulfur was pretty easy to catch and was really unnecessary in burning of fuels.

It actually took a lot of research and a lot of work to be able to burn coal without releasing much SO2.

Yeah in Europe. And what happened? Oh yeah, massive fraud and less innovation. I don't see Europe suddenly having all these great solutions. Look at this http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/europes-cap-and-trade-model-loses-billions-to-fraud/19274092

Did you read the article you actually linked to? The problem in question is primarily a problem with the set-up of the European value added tax in general. The scam used has noted by the article you linked been used with a variety of tangible goods before such as cell phones. This problem has very little to do with a cap and trade system.

However, as a whole if an energy source pollutes its not that efficient. For example, one gram of coal yields a small amount of energy, one gram of nuclear fuel yields much more power.

Are pollution and efficiency intrinsically connected? That's almost certainly not the case. It isn't even clear to me how you would go about defining that in a meaningful sense when you aren't talking about the same pollutants (how do you compare radioactive byproducts with CO2 or SO2 or particular for example?) I also don't know where you are getting the idea that energy prices are falling in India and China. Both countries are having a lot of trouble supplying enough electricity to their booming populations. Prices are going up, not down.

For example, Cap and trade does not stifle innovation. Quite the opposite, if a given industry normally produced a lot of CO2 then under a cap and trade system they have a lot of incentive to find ways to reduce that, more than they do in a general tax

No they don't. How do they have the incentive to do that when they have less and less working funds? If I have $50 million I can put into R&D for alternate energy without a carbon tax or cap and trade or $25 million I can put into R&D for alternate energy with cap and trade/carbon tax which do you think will get more work done?

In fact, cap and trade systems have been tried before.

Yeah in Europe. And what happened? Oh yeah, massive fraud and less innovation. I don't see Europe suddenly having all these great solutions. Look at this http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/europes-cap-and-trade-model-loses-billions-to-fraud/19274092

Yes, regulating So2 has worked because Sulfur was pretty easy to catch and was really unnecessary in burning of fuels.

Unfortunately, that's not the case. In the most efficient burning of a fossil fuel, the result is CO2 and water. There's no way to make the CO2 not be there. There's no wasted energy. Moreover, added CO2 is an externality http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality so individuals have no incentive to reduce the creation of CO2. This is true with pollutants in general. As with most difficult externalities, the impact of the pollution is not directly on the individual who created it, and it is diffuse enough that one cannot easily trace any specific bit of pollution back to any specific source. That's precisely why we have the government regulate the sources. Cap and trade is a very efficient system which takes advantage of market forces to more efficiently reduce pollution.

However, as a whole if an energy source pollutes its not that efficient. For example, one gram of coal yields a small amount of energy, one gram of nuclear fuel yields much more power.

Cap and trade will be like patents, perhaps a decent idea but with too many flaws in the implementation businesses will be paying protection money to carbon trolls, lobbyists will get rich, the environment will be more politicized, more expensive everything, lower standard of living and the environment doesn't even improve because falling energy prices in the developing world will lead to more US businesses moving to China and India. After all lets see here if this passes China/India will have:

A) Dirt-cheap educated labor
B) Dirt-cheap energy when compared to Europe/US
C) Lax IP enforcement allowing for better R&D cost to benefit ratios
D) A large population of consumers.

With jobs and businesses already making a mass immigration out of the US, why push them further out the door?

Maybe because it has happened before? Once they have your data, negotiated terms are only as strong as the morality of the person you are giving them too. Since large organizations can be amoral you are running a risk regardless of your terms.